The Enugu State Police Command on Monday denied reports that it dumped the corpses of 50 young men at the mortuary of the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital, Enugu.
The spokesman for the state command, Mr. Ebere Amaraizu, who spoke to our correspondent, said the mortuary’s records should reveal the circumstances surrounding the development.
The National Human Rights Commission had on Friday, in Abuja, alleged that 50 corpses, with red marker on them, were dumped by the police in the said morgue.
The rights commission disclosed that the corpses were discovered in the course of investigations into the alleged extra-judicial killing of one Chukwuma Ihezie by operatives of the command’s Special Anti-Robbery Squad.
According to the NHRC, the 50 corpses were discovered in the same mortuary where Ihezie’s body was deposited.
The NHRC therefore asked the Chief Judge of Enugu State to conduct a coroner’s inquest into the cause of Ihezie’s death, and also investigate the circumstances that led to the alleged dumping of the 50 corpses at the UNTH Mortuary.
The NHRC said the investigations would determine whether the killings were extra-judicial, noting that “extra-judicial execution is a violation of right to life contrary to Section 33 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, (as amended); Article 4 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights and Article 6 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights”.
But the command’s spokesman, Amaraizu, said it was improper to suggest that the police were guilty of extra-judicial killings.
Speaking to our correspondent on the telephone, Amaraizu said, “We have to look at the records, because every corpse that is brought to the mortuary is accounted for ─ records are kept. Every other thing can change, but the records cannot change.
“The records will be able to show who brought the corpses, and the cause of death.
“It could be accident or any other matter, but it is not enough to suspect and accuse the police of extra-judicial killings.
“The hospital has the records so the NHRC should have asked for the records.
“The fact is that the police are not the mortician, neither do the police work in the hospital, so the police cannot be held responsible for the corpses.
“We don’t have a mortuary, we don’t work there.”
Efforts to get the response of the hospital’s management were not successful as at the time of filing this report. Punch
